Edge of Worlds

CHAPTER SEVEN

Moon already knew this was going to be an awkward trip.

They flew through damp morning air of the suspended forest and found the flying boat still waiting near the meeting spot. As they drew near, Jade called back, “Land on the tree and wait there. I want to make certain it’s safe first.”

Moon tilted his wings to change direction and dropped down to land on the platform near the pond. Chime, carrying Merit, landed beside him. The others took positions on the branches above. Moon glanced around, making sure everyone was with them. For a moment he couldn’t spot Balm and Stone, but then saw them together on a branch further back in the tree. Stone had shifted to his groundling form, probably so they could talk.

“How different do you think this is going to be from traveling with the Golden Islanders?” Chime asked, his attention on the flying boat.

Jade circled above it once and landed on the deck. Several groundlings were visible, and she was speaking to Callumkal. With relief, Moon saw Delin step out of a doorway in the ridge that ran up the center of the deck. It wasn’t that he thought this was all an elaborate trap, it was just that even after all this time, suspicion was still a way of life for him. It wasn’t something that went away fast, or as far as he could tell, ever. He said, “Very different.”

Bramble, hanging onto Song, reached over to thump Chime in the shoulder. “It’s exciting.” Neither of the Arbora had been on a flying boat since they had come to the Reaches.

“That’s one word for it,” Chime muttered.

Jade lifted a hand, signaling them to come ahead.

Moon launched himself off the platform. He flapped to get above the boat, then dropped down to the deck. As the warriors landed behind him, he saw Stone was still in his groundling form, being carried by Balm. What’s that about? he wondered. But maybe Stone didn’t trust the boat’s deck to support his winged form. The warriors cast a few puzzled stares in Stone’s direction as Balm set him on his feet, but no one commented.

There were more crew members on the deck, and from their resemblance to Callumkal and Kalam, they were probably all Janderan. Though their skin varied a little in coloring, from a dark almost pure black to a deep warm brown, it had the same hard texture, and they all had the same rangy build. They also all radiated the same air of wary displeasure.

Jade caught Moon’s attention with a spine flick, and everyone shifted to groundling. Moon managed to do it in time with the others. It was a trick queens used when greeting other courts. Moon’s ability to participate was an achievement he was sure was wasted on the groundlings.

Callumkal nodded to them all. “We welcome you aboard.” He made a gesture. “Kalam will show you to your quarters.”

Despite the welcome, the crew still seemed uneasy, and watched them with an intensity that seemed both worried and unfriendly. Never a good combination, in Moon’s experience. Considering how the meeting had gone yesterday, it wasn’t a surprise. He didn’t expect the Raksura would have come off very well when the story of it was repeated to the rest of the Kishan.

Jade tilted her head to Callumkal in acknowledgment, and told Moon in Raksuran, “You take the others. Balm and Briar, stay with me.”

“Right,” Moon said, trying not to sound relieved. Standing out here under the weight of all this scrutiny made his nerves twitch and brought up uncomfortable memories. It had been a long time since he had been around any groundlings except the Kek and the other species who inhabited the floor of the Reaches. He was out of practice at being stared at.

As Kalam led the way through a door in the ridge along the deck, Delin fell in beside Moon and Chime. He said, “They asked if you and Jade should be put in a separate chamber, and I said that you would all prefer to be together. Was that right?”

Moon glanced back to make sure everyone who was supposed to be with him was actually following. Stone was tagging along at the back. “That’s right.” For safety while traveling, they always slept in groups.

The hatch had thick doors made out of layers of the moss material, with bars meant to fasten them against heavy weather. Inside the ridge was a broad hallway lit by large globes, glowing with light. They were mounted in the ceiling ridges, but were clearly made of something gelatinous. Delin saw Moon look up at them and he explained, “They are a luminescent fluid, harvested from a type of squid.”

The scents of strange groundlings and strange cooking smells almost overwhelmed the heady green odor of the ship. Kalam led them down a spiral stair to two levels below, to a larger room that seemed to be a gathering area. There were padded benches along the walls and stools scattered around. Several groundlings sat there, all Janderan. One said, in Kedaic, “So that’s them. I wonder why they brought the old man along.”

They were talking about Stone. Moon bit his lip to control his expression. Chime, walking between Moon and Delin, made an involuntary noise in his throat. As they reached the doorway to another passage, Moon glanced casually back and saw everyone had very blank expressions, except for River, who looked sardonic. He could read faint amusement from Stone’s normally opaque expression. This is going to be interesting, Moon thought.

The passage curved and twisted down, then opened into a winding corridor lined with doors. Kalam slid open the first. In carefully pronounced Altanic, he said, “These two are your rooms, next to Delin’s quarters. There is a bathing and elimination room at the end of the corridor. Uh . . .” He hesitated. Feeling unhelpful, Moon just stared at him.

Delin told Kalam, “I will explain how to use the equipment.”

Moon stepped in, and found a room much like the one Delin had, with beds built into the walls. There was an opening in the wall to the next room which doubled the available space. It looked as if it had been recently made; the edges were raw and the scent of the moss was more intense. More importantly, there were windows along the outer wall, set with crystal, but able to swing open and easily large enough to climb out of. Moon turned back to Merit and Bramble, who were peering through the doorway. He nodded, and they pushed in, followed by the warriors. Stone strolled in last.

Kalam stood uncertainly in the doorway. “If there is anything else you require . . .”

Moon told him, “We’ll ask.”

Kalam hesitated again, then retreated away down the corridor. Moon waited until the sound of his footsteps had faded, then checked the door. It was a light sliding panel with no lock, with no way anyone could seal them in.

Bramble looked at Stone and said, “Old man?”

Stone gave her a push to the head. “I am old.”

Except by “old” the Janderan had meant “useless.” Raksura just got stronger and usually larger as they grew older; most groundling species didn’t.

Delin said charitably, “Kalam is a good young person. They are an interesting species, and do not choose their gender until they near maturity. Kalam has only recently chosen his, and is perhaps too sheltered by his father.”

It made sense. Though Delin’s opinion was possibly colored by the fact that all his children and grandchildren were crewing or captaining wind-ships.

Merit put his pack against the wall. He looked like he was finding the situation daunting. “Is that how groundlings act toward everyone? Besides Delin and the other Golden Islanders.”

“They know what we are,” Moon said. He was used to this, but the others weren’t. “They’re afraid.”

Annoyed, Song tossed a pack onto one of the beds. “They always think we’re Fell.”

“It’s because we’re shapeshifters,” Chime added, poking at the padding on the lowest bed. “Groundlings are just afraid of shapeshifters.”

“Aren’t there any good shapeshifters?” Bramble wondered. “Besides us?”

“Not really.” Moon felt the deck move gently underfoot and went to a window. The ship was turning and lifting, starting the tricky job of navigating up past the mountain-tree branches and platforms. They must mean to travel above the tree canopy, which was somewhat safer. Hopefully Callumkal didn’t mean to go high enough to get into cloudwalker territory. “Not that I’ve ever heard of.”

“It is worth a monograph, perhaps.” Delin came to the window too. “This fear and distrust, which persists in so many cultures that we know of. Even those like Kish, where the Fell are not as great a threat now as they were in the past.”

Chime came to stand next to Moon, craning his neck to see out the window. “You think there’s a reason for it? Not just groundlings hearing stories of the Fell, and passing them on?”

“It’s intriguing to speculate,” Delin said. “We will have plenty of time for it on the journey.” He combed fingers through his beard thoughtfully. “You were able to duplicate the map from memory?”

Moon thought it was a good thing that it wasn’t Delin they were trying to fool. Chime told him, “We thought it was best.”

Delin nodded agreement. “It is a possibility that my grandchildren Niran and Diar have taken our wind-ship and crew to follow me here from Kish-Jandera. It would have taken them a little time to ascertain who I left with, and where we were bound. Once they do, they will follow me to Indigo Cloud to discover what happened. They will not wish to return to my daughter Elen-danar and inform her that they have lost me.”

Moon turned to stare at him. “You just left them in Kish with no idea where you went?”

Delin shrugged. “The situation was serious, and I did not want to delay the journey here with family arguments.” He admitted, “I hope that they will follow us to the sel-Selatra. It would be well to have the extra support.”

Stone gave Delin a sideways glance. “You don’t trust these people very much, do you?”

Delin watched the mountain-tree platforms drop past. “I don’t think they mean to betray us. But as you said, the Fell may have ways of finding out what the Kishan plan. I am not willing to leave our fate to chance.”

A faint vibration went through the deck, and a moment later the flying boat brushed past the leaves of a tree canopy as it moved up into increasingly brighter sunlight. They were on their way.

For a while, they just watched the Reaches from above, enjoying the breeze and the warm sun. When Moon was flying, the ground went by far too fast for much observation, and his attention was on the wind and keeping to the right direction. On a flying boat, there was endless time to see everything below you in detail.

Then Stone said, “We need to get the groundlings over the idea that we’re going to stay shut up in this room the whole time.”

Moon leaned against the window sill, reluctant. He wasn’t happy about socializing with these particular groundlings, but Stone was right. It would be a good idea to get them used to the fact that the Raksura would be moving freely around the boat. “We need to be careful.”

The look Stone threw him was not approving. “I know that.”

Moon managed to keep his mutter of I know you know that subvocal.

Chime eyed Stone warily. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to get in a fight,” Stone told him.

Moon stared in exasperation at the ceiling. Stone’s mood hadn’t improved any. Root said, “Really?” River made a snort of derision that seemed to be aimed at all of them. Chime protested, “It’s only the first day.”

Stone sighed, with that air that suggested he wished he had never mated in the first place. “That was a joke.” He went to where Delin had retired to a cushion in a corner, making notes. He gave Delin a nudge and said, “Come and give us a tour of the boat.”

Delin began to put up his writing materials. “Excellent idea.”

“I’ll stay here,” Moon said. He wanted a chance to look over the map again, and he wasn’t as interested in being stared at by groundlings as Stone was. To the others, he said, “Just remember, speak Altanic. Don’t let them know you understand Kedaic. And be careful what you say.”

He got dutiful murmurs of assent from the Arbora and Chime, Root, and Song, and a glance of contempt from River. They followed Stone and Delin out into the corridor, a bemused Merit trailing along last. Moon rubbed his face and wondered if any of their efforts at subterfuge would last past the first day. For a race who had supposedly originally used their shapeshifting abilities to trap and prey on groundlings, Raksura were lousy liars.

He got the map out of Chime’s pack and spread it across the bed. It didn’t show their entire route, just the coast and a portion of the sel-Selatra, then the trail of islands and sea-mounts leading toward the site of the city. It didn’t tell him much he didn’t already know, but at least he had the directions of their route in his head now.

He was folding the cloth map when someone shook the sliding door. Moon stuffed the map into the pack, pulled out a packet of writing paper Chime had brought, and pretended to be reading the first sheet. “Come in.” If the groundlings found out they had made one copy of the map, let alone three, the whole situation would be even more difficult than it already was.

The door slid open. Surprisingly, it was Captain Rorra. She said, “Am I allowed to speak to you?”

Moon kept his attention on the paper. “I don’t know; are you?”

Rorra stepped into the room. Stiff as one of the cork floorboards, she said, “It was my understanding that you are the property of the queen.”

Moon let his breath out in irritation, and looked up at her. “I understand the connotations of the word ‘property’ in Altanic and if you didn’t mean it to be an insult, I don’t think you would have used it.”

Her face worked, as if she was struggling with different emotions and didn’t want to show any of them. None of them appeared to be chagrin. “Isn’t that the case? An insult to you is an insult to her.”

It was hard to explain something that he didn’t quite understand himself, at least not well enough to articulate it. Especially when he was being provoked. “I belong to the court, just like everybody else in it.” He groped for the right words. “She protects me to show she can protect the court.”

“So you’re helpless, to be protected—”

Moon was on his feet in one smooth motion and looking down at her. “I’m really not,” he said. He didn’t shift, though the surge of pure anger at her words made it difficult.

A surge of anger. That’s odd, Moon thought.

He stepped back. Rorra’s expression went blank and her eyes hooded, a defensive response. Her voice trembled just a little as she said, “That’s good. We don’t need any dead weight in this expedition.”

Moon knew he had a temper, but she hadn’t been pushing him that hard. He had taken worse insults than that without threatening anybody. Something else had to be going on. “Hold it. Are you causing that?”

She took a step back. Now she was showing emotion. It was humiliation. Stiff, angry humiliation, but still humiliation. “I don’t mean to.”

Moon tasted the air, and caught just the faintest unfamiliar scent off her skin, almost too ephemeral to detect. He couldn’t place it. “What is it? There’s a scent. A pheromone?” He used the Raksuran word for it because he had no idea what it was in Altanic, or even if the idea existed in Altanic. “A scent that makes people react. That communicates.”

That she understood. Her expression was grim. “Yes. It isn’t intentional.”

“I’m sorry I reacted like that.” The fury had disappeared, overcome by a keen appreciation of just how awkward and embarrassing this was. At least it had happened in private. Moon fumbled for something to say. “That must be . . . hard to deal with.” Or impossible to deal with. But it must not affect every species in the same way. He doubted she would have survived very long if it had. “Not everyone can scent it?”

“No, some species can’t. Not the Kish-Jandera, like Callumkal and the others of this crew. They have little sense of smell.” Rorra swallowed hard, flustered. “I should go.”

It explained why Jade was so agitated around Rorra. As she turned to go, he said, “Tell me what it is. That might make it easier to ignore.”

She hesitated, a little of her habitual glare returning. He said, “Raksura know a lot about scents.” This was true. There were scent-markers that queens could produce and detect that no one else could, like the one that signaled to other queens that Moon was Jade’s consort. As a consort Moon experienced some scents more clearly than the warriors and Arbora did, and Arbora could follow scents that the warriors could barely detect. Stone hadn’t seemed to react to her at all, but then Stone was odd. Sitting here with her for a few moments would give Moon a chance to learn the scent so he could hopefully filter out the effect.

She grimaced, clearly reluctant, but she turned away from the door. “It’s a characteristic of my species of sealing. In saltwater, it’s a request for distance, a neutral signal. In the air . . . it is not neutral. I can’t control it. I can make other scents but this one is . . . not voluntary.”

Moon tried to imagine how difficult that would be to cope with in a tense situation. Anticipating it probably brought it on even more quickly. No wonder she radiated tension. He couldn’t think of anything to say. “I’m sorry.”

She looked away. “You’ve already apologized. I’m used to it.” She made what was obviously a determined effort to change the subject. “I actually wanted to speak to you about the underwater city you found. The creature inside it. Delin told us about it but I wanted to hear it from one of you.” She hesitated. “I wasn’t sure if I should speak to you without the queen’s permission, especially after what happened last time.”

Moon sat down on the bed. “What did you want to know?” Since the first attempt at a conversation had gone astray rapidly even from something as innocuous as can I talk to you?, it would be best to keep this one as on target as possible. Rorra seemed to be naturally reticent, and the scent that made everything she did seem like a deliberate affront had to make it worse. He wondered why she had left the sea at all, to put up with this. Plus the fact that her feet didn’t seem designed to walk on land and she needed the boots to compensate, she must have a powerful motivation. He felt asking what it was would just make the whole situation worse.

When Moon’s survival had depended on pretending to be a groundling for turns at a time, he had avoided asking questions, since they usually opened him up to being asked questions in return, often very hard-to-answer questions. Old habits died hard, and now he tended to operate on the principle that if people wanted him to know things, they would tell him.

Rorra seemed relieved to be talking about something, anything else. “Delin said you first thought it was a shapeshifter?”

“It was pretending to be one, to keep the Fell there while its prison was opening. What it was really doing was making us see things. You’ve heard of how the Fell can do that?”

“Yes. I’ve never experienced it.”

If she had, she would be dead, but there was no point in explaining that. “This was similar, but it was happening to all of us. A Fell ruler can do it to multiple groundlings, but it has to work on one person at a time. It has to get close to them and tell them what it wants them to see, or think, or remember. This thing made itself look like a forerunner. It made us all see that the city was filling up with water. It happened instantly. We could feel the water, but one of us was in groundling form and his clothes were dry. We realized it wasn’t real, but the thing was still able to hide from us under the water. The water that wasn’t really there.” It was hard to get across in words just how terrifying the experience had been.

Rorra frowned, but now he could tell she was worried and not angry. Maybe knowing about her odd scent did help. “That’s disturbing.”

“That’s one way to put it.” They didn’t know how many people the creature could fool at one time. It might be a handful of Raksura and Fell, it might be hundreds.

“And it attached a Fell to its own body?” Rorra appeared to fully realize just how horrible this was. “To consume it?”

“Maybe.” Moon tried to think of a way to describe it. “We saw a predator once that attached parts of its prey to its own body, to be able to do things that they could do.”

Rorra’s frown deepened in confusion. “How did the predator do that?”

“We don’t know. We had to kill it before we had a chance to ask.” At her expression he added, “I don’t think it would have told us anyway.”

She hesitated. “I ask about this because I want the expedition to be prepared.”

“That’s good,” Moon told her. He didn’t think it was possible to be prepared for some things, but it was a good thought.

Rorra said, “You’re different than I thought you’d be,” and abruptly left the cabin.

Moon decided that if he had almost gotten into a fight with someone who wasn’t even trying to argue with him, he had better check on the others.

He found his way to the common room without running into anyone. There were several Kishan inside, sitting on stools or benches. They had the same dark roughly-textured skin and curly dark hair as Callumkal and Kalam, but were all shorter and heavy-set. They weren’t talking or moving, and after a moment he realized that was because Bramble was in the room.

She was studying the maps mounted on the walls. The Kishan kept glancing at her, then down at the floor, then at each other, then at her again.

In her groundling form, Bramble still didn’t look harmless. She only came up to Moon’s shoulder, but she was wearing her work clothes, a light sleeveless shirt and pants cut off at the knee, and her stocky build and the muscles in her shoulders and forearms were obvious. Despite the flower someone had stuck into her hair before they left the colony, she looked like she could pick up one of the Kishan and easily toss them across the room. In her scaled and clawed form, she could easily rip them limb from limb, but nobody needed to mention that.

Then Bramble turned to the Kishan, pointed at one of the maps, and, speaking Altanic, said, “Is this where you’re from?”

The Kishan hesitated, but a brave one stood and said, “No, not exactly.” The silver-trimmed dark blue coat was open and there were four protuberances on her chest that looked like breasts, so Moon assumed she was female. She went to the map and stood barely a pace away from Bramble, though Moon could tell she was nervous. She pointed to the map. “Most of us are from Kedmar-Jandera. That city is the nearest port and trade capital, Irev-Jandera.”

Bramble bit her lip, studying the map. “All the cities are connected? You’re all called Kishan?”

“Yes. Well, there are a lot of different groups, and species, in all the different cities.” She indicated the others in the room. “Our species is called Janderi, and we’re related to the Janderan. We’re from the Jandera, which was where the Kish trade empire began. But in general, we’re all called Kishan. Or Kish-Jandera, if you’re just talking about us and the Janderan.”

“So . . .” Bramble hesitated, then evidently decided to just ask. “How do you decide what to do? When you’re all so spread out like that?”

Once it had turned into a general discussion and lecture about the history of the Kishan trade empire, and how groundlings governed themselves without queens or courts, Moon slipped away down the corridor. It was interesting, but he should probably find Jade.

He took the stairs up to the deck, and came out into bright sunlight and a steady breeze to see Jade still with Balm and Briar, talking to Callumkal and Vendoin. The two warriors had shifted to groundling, the wind catching at their curling hair. Moon saw Stone, Chime, Merit, and Delin up in the bow, leaning on the rail and looking down. It was tempting to join them, but Moon decided it was probably his duty to stand next to Jade and look decorative.

As he reached her, Callumkal turned to lead the way through a doorway in the ridge. Balm murmured to Moon, “He’s going to show us how the ship works.”

With the warriors, Moon followed Jade and Callumkal and Vendoin down a corridor and into the steering cabin in the bow. The long windows all around had top and bottom shutters angled to give some protection from the outside, and had reflective interior surfaces to allow a better view. The actual steering device was a long lever projecting out of the back wall, like the tiller of a small boat. A Janderi woman held it in position while Kalam consulted a small glass and metal directional device. There were benches around the walls, and a flat board that extended out from the wall for examining maps.

The only thing Moon couldn’t figure out were the pottery jars with clear crystal windows on a shelf along the back wall. They might have been decorative, but somehow he didn’t think so.

Callumkal spread the map out on the extendable board for Jade and Vendoin. Tactfully, no one mentioned the disagreement over it at their first meeting. Callumkal said, “Delin told us that the regions the forerunners must have occupied have not been mapped.”

Jade shrugged her spines. “Delin knows more of the forerunners than we do. There are no Raksuran stories about them.”

“That seems very odd,” Vendoin said. “There are a great many stories throughout the Kishlands of the different species who lived there before us. Not so many of the foundation builders, granted, for they seem to have come before all the others.”

After the discovery of the underwater city, the mentors at Opal Night had gone through their libraries looking for old forgotten legends. There had been nothing. The fact that the Raksura and the Fell had once been one species was referenced in many of the older stories, but there was nothing about what that species might have been like.

Chime and Delin had wondered if Opal Night was actually the first court, if the forerunners had come to the Opal Night mountain-tree when it was young, and had decided to camp there. If they had built the city that the roots of the tree had destroyed uncounted turns ago. If the fringe of the Reaches was where they had met the Arbora. There were no answers, though there were lots of questions.

And Moon might just be overly suspicious again, but he got the distinct feeling that Callumkal and Vendoin thought the Raksura were holding out on them. He noticed Kalam was staring at him, which didn’t help any. Kalam seemed to notice he was staring, and looked hurriedly away. That didn’t help either.

There wasn’t much room left around the map, so Moon sat down to wait, knowing Jade would go over it all later for the others. Kalam hesitated, then moved around the cabin to sit next to Moon.

“What are those jars for?” Moon asked, since sitting in awkward silence was worse than awkward talking.

“Oh.” Kalam looked around as if he had forgotten their existence. “They hold samples of the different growth materials of the ship, the ones that suspend it off the ground, the ones that protect it. In the jars, you can see if the samples need to be sprayed with water, or other fluids we can prepare. If they do, there’s a good chance the materials of the ship need tending too.”

It sounded like a wise precaution. “So this ship was grown in Kish?”

“Yes, by the Kish-Latre. That’s what we call them. You can’t say their name in Altanic or Kedaic or any of the other trade languages. They live under mounds of earth in the jungles, and they grow all sorts of plants and molds that can be used for a lot of different things.” Kalam hesitated. “Will you tell me something about Raksura?”

Moon saw they were almost done with the map, so an escape would be available soon. Vendoin was explaining something to Jade about wind patterns affecting trade and habitation in the sel-Selatra islands and there was only so long Jade was going to listen to that. “Maybe.”

Kalam ducked his head, a gesture that Moon wanted to read as shy, though he wasn’t sure if it meant the same thing for Kalam’s species. “Is it true you weren’t always a consort? Scholar Delin mentions it in his book.”

“I was always a consort, I just didn’t know it, because I had never seen a Raksura before.” Moon read Kalam’s confused expression and explained, “I was an orphan. It’s a long story.”

Callumkal gently interrupted the wind-pattern lecture with, “I know you will want to see the growth chambers for the materials that keep the ship in flight.”

As the others moved to the door, Moon stood to follow, and said, “You should ask Delin, he knows all about it.” He noticed Balm looking at him with an expression he would have described as wry amusement. Whatever that was, Moon thought, and followed Jade out.

At sunset, when they had retired to their cabin with Delin, Moon explained to the others about Rorra’s scent and what it meant. The breeze had died away and the room was warm and softly lit by the light globes mounted on the walls. Root hung from the ceiling by his foot claws, but the other warriors were getting ready to bed down on the floor.

Jade heard the story with a mix of relief and embarrassment, and said, “That explains a lot. I thought I was losing my mind, getting so angry because a sealing looked at me the wrong way.” She turned to Stone, where he was stretched out on one of the shelf beds. “Didn’t you scent it?”

Stone sat up on one elbow. “I scented something, but I filtered it out. It wasn’t Fell, that’s all I cared about.”

Delin, seated on one of the stools with Bramble and Merit at his feet, admitted that he must have been affected too. “It’s a very disturbing thought, that I have misjudged her because of it.”

Moon asked him, “Do you know anything about her? Why is a sealing living inland?”

Delin said, “Kalam told me that she comes from an isolated deepwater sealing kingdom off the western coast of Vesselae, near the sea-trade route called the al-Denar. She lost her right set of fins, in the spot a foot would be on a groundling, to a predator, and she left the sea because of it. The sealing healer changed her body, so she may breathe air at all times, and she came inland and found work with Callumkal.”

That explained the clunky boots. They must be built up on the inside to compensate both for the missing fins and the ones that were left.

“They could change the way she breathes but not just fix her fin?” Briar said, helping Song pull blankets out of the packs. “That’s not very good healing.”

Merit frowned, and said, mostly to himself, “That’s terrible healing.”

Delin said, “She has never spoken much of it but it was apparent that she faced great hardship at first.”

Moon agreed. It sounded like an Aeriat having their wings removed. He wondered if it had been voluntary after all.

Disturbed, Bramble said, “Can we go talk to her about it?”

“No, because it’s private. Don’t bring it up unless she does first.” Moon might not be an expert on groundling behavior, but some things were obvious even to him.

Bramble still looked doubtful. In their defense, the Arbora’s concept of privacy was vague at best. It was probably difficult for them to imagine not living in a way where everyone around you knew everything about you at all times.

River was wrapped up in his blanket in the far corner, as if trying to stay as far removed from the rest of them as possible. He helpfully said, “Groundlings don’t want to talk to us, haven’t you noticed?”

“Talk to us, or talk to you?” Chime asked, also not helpfully, “because if it’s the latter—”

Jade broke it up with, “This room is too small for an argument, unless someone wants to have an argument with me.”

That stopped the discussion, and as Delin showed them how to dim the light globes with a little lever that caused the luminescent fluid to flow back into a pocket in the moss wall, everyone settled down to sleep, or try to sleep.

Moon was in one of the beds with Jade wrapped around him, the others in the beds or the floor according to inclination. Bramble and Merit had talked Delin into staying with them, and had used some bed cushions to make a pallet for all three of them on the floor.

Jade whispered in Moon’s ear, “I still don’t know if this trip is a good idea or not.”

It wasn’t something she was willing to admit to the others, and truthfully, Moon didn’t know either. He wondered if their clutch had noticed he was gone yet, and buried his face in the warm scales of her neck.

The night was uneventful, and the next day even more so as they passed over the nearly impenetrable mountain-tree canopy of the Reaches. The crew seemed more than content to ignore the Raksura despite Bramble’s determination to make friends and Stone’s determination not to acknowledge that most of the Kishan didn’t want them here.

Moon knew he needed to get a better idea of the whole situation. Vendoin was more gregarious than the others, so that evening he wandered over to where she stood at the railing and took up a position nearby. Not too close, but not so far away that it would make conversation difficult.

The breeze had died and the air was warm and damp, the sinking sun turning the limitless blue sky a gray-violet. The warriors had spent most of the day napping. Below, the great green sea of the Reaches was just starting to give way to sporadic pockets of smaller trees, or open meadow. One meadow contained giant lumpy gray things, at least forty paces tall and more than that wide, that might be sleeping grasseaters with large armor-like scales, some other sort of animal, or a hive or habitation for groundlings. Whatever it was didn’t show any interest in the flying boat passing over it.

The Kish weren’t much worried about anything on the ground. Callumkal had shown them the boat’s weapons earlier in the day, two larger versions of the fire weapon that Rorra had carried at their first meeting. One was concealed in a compartment up in the bow, the other in the stern. Moon thought they would be very helpful as long as you had enough warning to use them.

Vendoin didn’t speak immediately, and Moon was considering what to say for an opening remark, when he felt someone staring at him. He twisted around, scanned the windows in the ridge that ran down the center of the boat, then up to the upper cabin level. He saw Kalam leaning in a window there, not looking out toward the view, but down at Moon. Their gazes met and Kalam withdrew in confusion.

Moon snorted, and turned back to the railing.

Vendoin had noticed. She said, “He’s only curious. Please don’t take offense.”

Moon lifted his shoulders, and then not sure she would understand the gesture, said, “I’m used to being stared at.”

“Are you?” Vendoin turned to regard him more seriously. “I thought Raksuran fertile males lived a secluded life.”

The other Kishan didn’t seem to know much about Raksura, but it sounded like Vendoin at least had bothered to question Delin, even if she hadn’t read his book, like Kalam. “They do, but I wasn’t with a court until a few turns ago.”

Vendoin waited a moment, then said, “Now, you’ve aroused my curiosity. Where were you if not with a court?”

“The court I was born into was destroyed by Fell, when I was too young to remember.” That wasn’t quite true, but the bits and pieces of fragmented memories he had weren’t worth mentioning.

“We have that in common,” Vendoin said, looking out toward the distance again. “My people were driven out of their original home by the Fell three generations ago, and took refuge in the Kishlands.” She turned to him again. “How did you escape?”

At least Vendoin might have a better grasp on how dangerous the Fell were than the other Kish. “A warrior escaped with me and a few Arbora children. They were all killed later, and I was alone, until Stone found me and brought me to Indigo Cloud.”

The rough patches on Vendoin’s face moved. It might be inquiry, puzzlement, or even concern. Moon couldn’t tell. Vendoin said, “But that was the vital time of your development, was it not? From before adolescence to adulthood?”

Moon felt compelled to point out, “It wasn’t by choice.”

“Of course. But did it not make everything . . . very difficult?”

“It did,” Moon admitted. So Vendoin didn’t think he had spent the entire time huddled alone in a forest somewhere, he added, “I traveled, lived in different groundling cities and settlements.”

Vendoin cocked her head, maybe as a gesture of understanding, or maybe of curiosity, it was hard to tell. “As a Raksura?”

“As a groundling. It was in the east, where they’re more afraid of Fell, so I couldn’t show anyone what I was.”

“I see.” Moon wasn’t sure she did, but he wasn’t going to argue. And he thought all her questions gave him an opening to ask some in return. “Have you worked with Callumkal for a long time?”

“Oh, not so long.” Vendoin didn’t appear to mind the question. “My people are called the Hians, and I am a visitor from the Hia Iserae, which is to the north along the Imperial Edge, near the basin of Samin-rel. I was with the archives there, and studied in particular the foundation builders. During the season of spring rain, Callumkal invited me to come to Kedmar and work with him on the map.”

“So you don’t know what the foundation builders looked like?” Moon was wondering if their ruins were just less well-preserved forerunner remains.

“We don’t even know if they were one species, or a collective.” Vendoin sighed. “But they left very little behind, whoever they were. We have fragments of carvings and images and one method of writing that seems to be mainly poetry, and which we are not sure we have deciphered correctly. We have a great deal of speculation, and legends that may be handed down from some dim past, or that may have been constructed by later generations to explain things they did not understand.”

“So do you think the sea-mount city is foundation builder or forerunner?”

“There is great debate over that, such great debate, one would call it arguing and shouting.” Vendoin sounded weary. “The map is on the stones of the foundation builders for a reason. That is all I will admit to.” She made a dismissive gesture. “Others construct what I can only think are fanciful stories about it.”

Moon said, “Does Callumkal think the city was made by the foundation builders?”

“No, he inclines to the theory that it was the forerunners, but I’m not sure he thought so before he encountered Delin’s work.” Vendoin hesitated. “The two others with you, the Arbora. Delin says they are the same species as Raksura, as odd as it seems, and that you come from the same family groups.”

“That’s right.” The Arbora had been a different species once, but had joined with the Aeriat at some point in a past so distant that no record of why it had happened had survived. And Moon didn’t know how the family groups of Vendoin’s species worked, but Raksuran court bloodlines were a complicated tangle. Since Merit was a mentor he was probably closely related to a consort. Considering Merit’s age, it might have been Rain, Pearl’s consort, or Dust or Burn, who had been sent away to other courts when Rain died. Moon didn’t know about Bramble. “The Arbora used to be a separate species, a long time ago. Then something happened and . . .” Moon made a vague gesture he wasn’t sure was very helpful. “It’s in Delin’s book.”

Vendoin politely pretended that what Moon had said made sense. “Is it true that the Fell and the Raksura come from the forerunners? That is also in Delin’s book.”

Moon felt himself go still. He found it very hard to read Vendoin. Some groundlings were better at communicating with different species than others, and he wasn’t sure if Vendoin wasn’t one of them, or if Moon just wasn’t interpreting her body language correctly. He said, “Yes.”

Vendoin’s head tilted as she studied him. “So. I think it may be inferred. From the physical resemblance.”

Moon made himself shrug, though he wasn’t sure how Vendoin would interpret the gesture. “It’s not something we know anything about. There aren’t any stories from that time.”

Vendoin was quiet a long moment, then said, “I see. Perhaps if this city is forerunner, and we can discover its secrets, it will shed some light on this myth.”

Moon leaned on the railing and looked into the distance. Light was the last thing the “myth” needed.